Court Cultures: Texts and Contexts

Trinity College, University of Dublin
18–19 June 2024
 
Following a Covid-imposed hiatus, we are delighted to invite proposals for the 2024 meeting of the ICLS (British and Irish Branch), hosted by the Trinity Centre for Medieval and Renaissance Studies and the French Department, Trinity College Dublin. Papers may address any aspect of court culture within an international framework and across a broad range of disciplines which interconnect with literature. Underpinning the conference will be the perennial questions: what is the place of the court in the construction of courtly culture? What is the relationship between the court writer and his/her subject? How do written texts relate to other forms of premodern culture? And how do we transmit, respond to and refashion courtly texts today? Quite apart from advancing scholarship in the field, the conference will be a welcome opportunity for scholars of courtly literature to develop their collaborative research networks.

We invite proposals in French or in English (maximum 200 words) for either 20-minute papers or full panels of three papers (each of 20 minutes duration) to be submitted by 5 p.m. on Friday 16 February 2024 to Dr Sarah Alyn Stacey (salynsta@tcd.ie) and Dr Thomas Hinton (T.G.Hinton@exeter.ac.uk ). Acceptance of papers will be confirmed by Friday 1 March 2024.

Papers may be on any aspect of courtly literature but we would particularly welcome contributions on the following themes:
 
Text and image
Manuscripts and the early-printed book
The performance of the courtly world
Writing and rewriting the courtly text
Reading the courtly text
Music and the text
Translation at/of the court
Court and politics
Marriage and alliances
The encomiastic text
Humour 
Rhetoric
Patronage
Conservation of the courtly text
Libraries and special collections
Legend and fantasy in the representation of the courtly context
Church and Court